


After the Run

by CanonCannon



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Insecurity, M/M, Protective Daryl Dixon, Shy Daryl Dixon, Stargazing, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-19
Updated: 2017-02-21
Packaged: 2018-09-25 13:58:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9823607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CanonCannon/pseuds/CanonCannon
Summary: “Bastard ain’t hurt,” Daryl huffs, sounding disgusted. “We just got back. One of them towns was a gold mine, we couldn’t fit much on the bike. Gotta take the truck back.”Then he decides to hit the wall after all, although Maggie knows he pulls the punch.“Alright, so if it was a good run, what’s got you all riled up?”“Ain’t taking him out again,” Daryl replies instantly.





	1. Chapter 1

Paul is drying his hair after a quick shower when he hears a sharp banging on his trailer door. He hurries to open it, expecting Maggie. He’d wanted to talk to her about the run.

Ok, he’d wanted to talk about Daryl. About what the fuck it meant when a generally tame redneck pins you to a water tower demanding answers, glares at you for fifteen minutes without speaking when you give them, then ignores you for the rest of the day—which is tough to do when you’re sharing a small motorcycle—all because you were later than he expected to a rendezvous point.

Needless to say, the scout is surprised when he opens his door to find Daryl himself standing there, a largish paper bag dangling from one arm.

Paul is pathetically relieved that they’re back to the glaring stage instead of the ignoring stage.

“Daryl! Hey.”

More glaring.

Paul would apologize, if he only knew what to apologize for.

“Are you ok? It’s, uh, pretty late. I was about to-”

The older man shoves his way into the trailer. He tosses the bag to the ground, spilling the contents. A few berries roll out, plus some flowers Paul doesn’t recognize.

What the hell is happening here?

—

_“Maggie! Maggie, where the hell are you?!”_

_Jumping up from her desk in Barrington House’s comfortable library, Maggie stares at her closed door. She knows that voice, but the tone is straight out of the past—anger raising the pitch and sharpening the accent in a way she hasn’t heard in ages, maybe even since the farm._

_A moment later Daryl bursts in the door, moving quickly enough that her instincts want to catalogue him as a threat. He marches towards her aggressively until he sees that Hershel is laying beside her, blinking up at the world from his basinet._

_When he notices the baby Daryl rears back and instead begins to circle the room restlessly. Maggie’s glad he didn’t get in her face; she’s not sure how she would have reacted to that._

_“Daryl, what happened? Something go wrong on the run?” Her eyes scan his body but she doesn’t see any injury. “Oh my God, is Jesus-”_

_He spins away from her at the name, looking like he’s about to punch the wall. He stops himself and hangs his head, breathing deeply as if to calm himself._

_“Bastard ain’t hurt,” Daryl huffs, sounding disgusted. “We just got back. One of them towns was a gold mine, we couldn’t fit much on the bike. Gotta take the truck back.”_

_Then he decides to hit the wall after all, although Maggie knows he pulls the punch._

_“Alright, so if it was a good run, what’s got you all riled up?”_

_“Ain’t taking him out again,” Daryl replies instantly._


	2. Chapter 2

“You brought… plants?” Paul gestures at the paper bag on his floor.

“Food,” Daryl grunts, turning to face him. “Gotta blanket?”

“Huh?”

“Blanket. Gotta spare one?”

Paul just stares at him.

The hunter looks away and, without warning, climbs on top of the dining table. His boots look like he’s been wading through the pigsty. Watching a clump of filth fall onto the pristine table, Paul really hopes that’s not actually where the man had been hiding all afternoon.

“Daryl! Daryl, what the hell?”

The hunter shoots him a quelling stare and fiddles with the trap door on the ceiling, opening it up. “Blanket,” he repeats impatiently, holding out a hand.

Mystified, Paul walks to his bed and hands him the folded quilt from the bottom. Daryl sets it onto the roof then hoists himself through the trap door, bits of mud raining down in his wake.

A moment later the redneck’s face pops over the opening. “Whatcha waiting for? Get your ass up here.”

Paul looks absently around the trailer, as if asking for help from an invisible audience.

When no help arrives, he climbs onto the table.

“Hit the lights first,” the scout hears from above him.

Pinching his nose, he moves towards the lantern instinctively. Then he realizes what Daryl’s just asked.

An impossible idea begins to form in Paul’s mind.

“Should I, uh, bring pillows?”

“Not unless you’re even more of a princess than I thought,” Daryl bites out from somewhere on the roof.

“What about the food?” the younger man calls out as he twists the lantern dial off, unable to keep the nerves from his voice.

“Nah, that’s later,” Daryl replies. Footsteps move away from the hatch.

Desperately curious, Paul clambers onto the table and lifts himself gracefully up to the roof, where Daryl has spread out the quilt.

The redneck is sprawled flat on his back over half of it, hair falling away from his face, leaving the other side of the blanket open. Open for Paul.

Because Daryl wants to stargaze with him on a fucking picnic blanket on the roof. Apparently there will be food later.

Paul’s heart starts beating double-time.

—

_“Daryl. Talk to me,” Maggie says patiently._

_He’s pacing again._

_“Did he- did Jesus do something that made you… uncomfortable?” She closes her eyes for a moment and hopes like hell that that isn’t the problem._ _Whatever crisis being pursued by a man is going to cause the redneck, Maggie does not want to be the one to talk him through it. She loves the surly bastard but she’s not prepared for that conversation._

_“Yeah,” Daryl answers with a growl. “Uncomfortable having to wait all fucking night at our checkpoint for his stupid ass. And you know why?” He spits at her with real venom for the first time in her memory. They’ve hit his main point, the crux of his anger. “Guy doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground, that’s why. He shouldn’t be out there.”_

_She blinks. “Daryl, he’s- he’s good out there. One of the best. You know he is or you wouldn’t have taken him. What are you-”_

_“We got separated by a herd. Small ‘un, but enough. So I led ‘em off on the bike, right? Ninja boy’s supposed to meet me at the water tower in Culpepper, shouldn’t’ve taken more than two hours on foot.” Daryl makes a fist and inhales, seething. “Asshole doesn’t show up until the next day, ten hours past when I expected him. Wanna know why?”_

_Maggie is beginning to see where this is going._

—

“Daryl, what’s happening here?” Paul lays down on the quilt, which insulates fairly well against the metal trailer roof. It’s cooling down at night. He wishes he’d grabbed a hat to pull over his damp hair.

“You know how to find the Big Dipper?” The hunter asks as he settles.

“What?” Paul can feel the man’s warmth across the small distance between them. The quilt isn’t very large.

“The Big Dipper. Don’t know the fancy name for it, but one of my daddy’s friend’s called it the Drinking Gourd. Or could you find the Great Bear, maybe?”

Paul blinks at the sky, not able to remember the last time he looked at the stars just to look. It’s beautiful out, completely cloudless. He enjoys the view for a few moments.

A sharp elbow connects with his ribs. “Well?”

“Give me a minute,” Paul murmurs. When he finds it, he leans closer to Daryl to point it out. It’s low on the horizon. He lets his arm cross Daryl’s body, close but not touching. “It’s there, right?”

“Hmm,” Daryl responds, his voice soothingly quiet. “Sometimes you can’t find it until later in the evening, but we got a good view up on this hill. Helps that there’s so few lights nowadays.” Daryl’s very intense, staring into Paul’s eyes through the dark. “Since it’s fall now, Big Dipper’s close to the horizon. In the spring it’s higher up.”

“Low in autumn, high in spring. Got it,” Paul echoes dutifully.

“See how its got three stars in the handle?”

“Uh huh.” They’re very close together. Paul’s heart is still beating fast, blood pumping staccato through his veins.

“Side farthest from the handle, pretend some water’s pouring out of the cup in a straight line.”

Paul watches the man’s face in the moonlight. Daryl is even handsomer when he’s not glaring at everything.

“First bright star the water would touch is the Pole Star. Also called the North Star cause it’s always north.” Daryl’s voice is husky. Paul’s managed to scoot close enough that his shoulder and thigh are pressed against the other man’s side. He leans up on one elbow, looking at the North Star but also looking at Daryl.

The hunter glances at him, as if surprised to find him so close. Even in the moonlight Paul can read the sudden emotion on his features as he sits up quickly, jerking his face away.

“And that’s why any fucking Cub Scout coulda found me last night instead of waiting for sunrise, city boy,” Daryl says, posture defensive, voice suddenly loud and grouchy again.

Paul throws back his head and laughs into the night sky.

Because on the one hand, he’d read the situation all wrong.

But on the other hand, he really, really hadn’t.

 


	3. Chapter 3

_“Ok, why was he so late?” Maggie bites the inside of her cheek to stop from smiling._

_“Sumbitch couldn’t find it in the dark. Knew what direction to go, but he said he had to wait for goddamn sunrise to find north. I thought the herd had…” Finally some of the frustration drains from his voice, but he’s still angry. “How come you been letting him wander around on his own out there when he don’t even know…” the man trails off again, scowling at the room’s antique rug, his thumb disappearing between his teeth._

_Moving to pick up Hershel so she can hide her expression, the new mother says calmly, “Alright, so he has some gaps in what he knows, but he’s still one the best we have at Hilltop.”_

_“Enid would make a better runner,” Daryl argues stubbornly. “Kid might not be a fighter yet but she ain’t about to get lost on a clear night like that fucking city slicker.”_

_Maggie talks over him, “You don’t have to take him again if you don’t want to, but you know Jesus is never going to stay behind the walls. He wouldn’t even if I tried to make him. And I won’t, Daryl. Other than you and Sasha, he’s the best I’ve got.”_

_Daryl shoots her a halfhearted glare and, clenching his jaw, moves to leave the office._

_He hesitates at the door. “I didn’t wake up the kid when I came in, did I?”_

_She bounces Hershel a little. “Nah, he was up. Wanna hold him? Hard to be mad when you’re holding a cute baby.”_

_“Got shit to do,” Daryl says, still a little stiff. He closes the door gently behind him._

_With him gone Maggie lets herself smile, humming to Hershel and remembering the summer after the farm fell. There weren’t many pleasant memories of that time, but there were some._

_“Want to hear a story about your grandfather?” she whispers to her son softly. “He had no sense of direction. None at all. And it drove your Uncle Daryl absolutely bonkers, worrying what would happen if Granddaddy got separated from the family. So one summer your uncle spent just about every night by the campfire trying to teach us all these little tricks he knew so we wouldn’t get lost. Me and your Aunt Bethy learned real quick, but Grandaddy…”_

_She continues talking for almost half an hour, drifting from one subject to the next until it’s time for Hershel’s nap._

—

“What?” Daryl barks suspiciously as Paul grins up at him. He stands up, movements jerky and abrupt. “Why're you laughing at me, I ain’t the dumbass who showed up _hungry_ and ten hours late to a- Christ, now what? Paul? _Paul!_ ”

The man sounds so put out that Paul forces himself to rein it in. “I’m not laughing at you. I’m not. Thank you for teaching me this stuff, it’s useful.” Fighting a smirk with difficulty, he adds, “I’m guessing the bag downstairs is full of food I _should_ have been able to find in those woods last night?”

“No reason for you to be hungry in them forests ’til winter. Ain’t been a drought since last year,” Daryl mutters.

Paul’s chest shakes with silent giggles.

“Damn it, it ain’t funny! If you’re gonna be out there, you need to know this shit!” The redneck looks indignant and maybe a little hurt.

The younger man manages to stop laughing for the second time in as many minutes. He stretches his spine, folding his arms behind his head and smiling up at the man above him before demanding, “Get back down here.”

“Why?” Forever suspicious, Daryl takes a step away rather than laying back down.

“Just do it. Please.”

Daryl obeys hesitantly, with the air of a man gingerly testing something to see if it will hold his weight.

“I really like you, you know,” Paul says, pushing up on his elbow again once the other man is settled.

“That’s- I don’t give a shit about-”

Paul interrupts him with the softest possible kiss. He keeps his hands to himself but presses his body gently into the other man’s space.

The hunter pulls away from the kiss immediately. His expression is vulnerable, eyes wary and voice quiet. “This one of your tricks? Some big joke on the stupid trailer trash-”

“Daryl,” Paul chides, then pecks him on the lips again before continuing, “Shut up.”

And Paul kisses him and kisses him until they’re both breathless under the brilliant stars.

 

**Author's Note:**

> A very very early version of this was going to be the epilogue to Nightmares, but I went a different direction.


End file.
